Cannabis seeds could soon be coming to B.C. stores

ProgenyBio would be just the second company in the country to offer seeds on the legal market for home cultivation

DIY enthusiasts, gardening geeks, and cannabis lovers in B.C. may soon be spoiled for choice.

Cannabis nursery licence holder and owner of ProgenyBio Agricultural Services Inc., Geoff White is in talks with the BC Liquor Distribution Branch (LDB) to get seeds from his nursery on store shelves, Business of Cannabis reports.

The first batch of seeds to be made available is called Kilimanjaro. The seeds feature a potency of approximately 12 per cent tetrahydrocannabinol (popularly known as THC, the intoxicating compound in the cannabis plant) as well a variety of other cannabinoids. White’s nursery, located in the Okanagan valley, has held a Health Canada-issued licence since last November.

“Our Cannabis Operations team is in the process of registering ProgenyBio as a vendor, and is in the process of registering their product which will be made available to wholesale customers,” Viviana Zanocco, Manager, Corporate Communications for the provincial retailer told Business of Cannabis.

“These customers include private cannabis retailers and our BC Cannabis Stores. It is up to the retailers whether they carry products offered by our Wholesale division. There is no date of estimated delivery at our end, so no telling when our Wholesale customers might order product or have it in their stores.”

A Dealer’s Licence used to be what was required by the federal regulator to produce, gather or cultivate cannabis for scientific purposes. After passage of the Cannabis Act, these licence holders were migrated to the new Analytical Testing licence category, of which there are currently 99 listed publicly. Health Canada says there are 105 active licences currently.

Under federal regulations, a cannabis nursery is allowed to produce and distribute cannabis plants and cannabis plant seeds both to other commercial cannabis growers, as well as through the various provincial consumer supply channels. While seed production under a Nursery licence is limited to 538 sq. ft., there is no limit on space for non-flowering clones or other aspects of cannabis research or propagation such as tissue culture.

This five-year history in the regulated cannabis space in Canada has allowed ProgenyBio to transition to a nursery very efficiently, says White, allowing the company access to a wide array of cannabis genetics they could migrate in under their Nursery license, while also doing so at a very low cost due to their existing infrastructure as a research facility.

Read the full article at TheGrowthOp